road, not mushroom; WMD

Took the train into London this morning, where I will stay overnight with NYC friends who now live here Notting Hill. I spent the afternoon braving the horde on Portobello Road, the Saturday outdoor antique, food, and chochky market. It's a mob scene, with hordes of teenagers from the suburbs and tourists from everywhere (not unlike Greenwich Village). I picked up some 19th-century prints some for the new apartment and for gifts (they travel flat). The kids hang on the corners in front of the pubs, drinking beer and eating take-out food out of aluminum tins. But I am not a kid, so I had a tasty fennel and basil rissotto and a salad at a cafe called the Grocer on Elgin, rested my feet and read another chapter of the dissertation I should have finished reading already... and bought some fresh goat cheese and a loaf of bread to eat later.

Checked out the theater listings and chose a play showing at the National Theater, "Landscape with Weapon." Serious but humorously done, about an aeronautic engineer who designs the ultimate weapon and then balks when he realizes that he won't have any control over its use. I had a great seat in the third row. The theater is on the south bank of the Thames, near the Tate Modern and the London Eye (ferris wheel). For a review of the play, see LINK, left.